Selfishly, we spent a few days traveling in the West before making the grand return home to Wisconsin, but I did owe it to my boyfriend to show him more than just the land of cheese and beer. When I told my parents our arrival date my dad's response was, "oh great, we're building a playset the next day, 8am start." Not quite the welcome I was expecting, but I was also excited we had plans and were going to be immediately wrapped up in home life. We had been busy in Washington, trying to fit in sightseeing while still extremely jet-lagged, so I was looking forward to down time, although there really was not all that much. Building the playset was actually a lot of fun and definitely required a lot of hands. Seohui and I spent a good chunk of time sorting the various pieces of wood so they were ready to go with the step by step instructions. We also took a lot of breaks to chat with my mom, hang out with my newborn baby nephew, and just generally avoid working. My uncle is handyman extraordinare, and I"m pretty sure without him this thing would not have been built, but by the end of the day we had a functional piece of equipment. Unfortunately the slide required further work, so it was mostly just the swings that my niece could play on, but she was thrilled. She's only 3 but has the personality of a teenager, and was so excited to announce that she had her own playground at her house. Aside from being put to work doing manual labor, I had a lot planned for our month in Wisconsin, a few day trips, a concert at Summerfest, Brewers baseball game, and of course lots of eating and drinking. Seohui also wanted to cook for my family and of course no one was going to turn down that offer. To ensure we had everything he needed, and to show him what an American Koreatown is like, we drove down to Illinois on our third day at home. It's an easy 1 hour drive from where I live to the large H mart and a variety of other shops in restaurants in the Glenview IL area, and I am no stranger to the area, often having to stock up on supplies or get a good meal while back in the states. Months before even planning my trip back to the States a friend of mine from College sent me a message about the Odesza concert that was going to be in Milwaukee at Summerfest. In all honestly I am not a huge concert goer, I'm more of a driving alone in my car or headphones on music kind of person, but this looked like a great show. It was also a great excuse to take Seohui to Summerfest and show him the hot mess that is half of Milwaukee. The show was amazing, although the festival was meh - none of us are big drinkers (anymore) and being at Summerfest nearly sober was a wild experience, I felt so out of place. Another day spent in Milwaukee was enjoyed at the lakefront, sampling different food of Milwaukee and of course stopping by one of our endless list of breweries. During our first week in the US there were numerous moments of surprise at how big everything is, servings of food and the 64 oz cup for soda at the gas station taking high spots on the list. Honestly, I'm still a little surprised everytime I return, what I've come to know as a large is once again a small. Seohui also had curiosity about all of the fast food available, and although this is no where on my list of things to do I played along and took hime to some of the best - Wendy's, Taco Bell, Chick-fil-A all making the cut. Although this summary is a mishmash of information, my brain is mush trying to recall everything we packed in while home this summer - that's what I get for writing about it 6 months and 3 countries later though. In reflection, I'm realizing that I did a great job of mixing the ordinary with the exploration. I wanted to show Seohui where I'm from and introduce him to things, people and foods, but without feeling like we were on a grand tour of Wisconsin. There's still a list of things I need to write about, a few of our trips outside of greater Milwaukee, the food we ate and some of the other fun we got up to; this is after all, just the beginning.
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